Do You Like the Sound of Your Voice? And Your Regional Accent?

This article surprised me. A survey of over 2,000 people in England found that almost three quarters of the people surveyed said they don’t like the way they sound and don’t like their regional accent.

(THEN CHANGE IT, MATE.)

Now this is what I’m wondering. Is this just an English thing? All styles of accents have a class component, within the US as much as anywhere. However, in England the class thing is very much on the surface, in a way that it’s not here. That is to say, if you have an accent that announces you as having no money and no education, you might not know it in the US, but you probably would know it in England, especially if you’ve seen MY FAIR LADY. Also, in England, there may be class constraints that keep people from changing their way of speaking — a cultural reinforcement not to put on airs — while America, in a sense, is all about putting on airs, or at least finding out who you want to be and then being it.

That said, maybe this is not as culturally specific as I’m thinking. Maybe 3/4s of the people the world over hate the way they sound.

For myself, I could not do what I do if I hated the way I sound. When I used to do TV, I’d come home, re-wind the tape and watch myself about 20 times in a row (literally), so I could learn to get better at it. (And you can see I learned, if you look at yesterday’s entry and note the difference between, say, the early 1995 clip [it’s the one that runs 9:41] and the mid-1998 clip [it’s the one that runs 1:54]. I didn’t get great, but I got better.) Likewise, with the podcast, I listen to each one about three times, looking for ways to improve. But of course, if I just generically hated the way I sound, I wouldn’t be able to listen (or watch) at all. I’d be too busy od’ing on myself and throwing up.

So here’s the question: Do you like the way I sound, too? No, that’s not the question — that’s a joke. The question is, do you like the way you sound? And if you don’t, what’s wrong with you?

One more thing: I think most people really have no idea what they sound like or look like (that searching, bug-eyed person in the mirror is a bad likeness), which is why I think doing TV on a regular basis is a real privilege and something that would benefit anybody who gets the chance to do it. You find out what you look like, and in almost every case, you look better than you think. (Because you have to look better than the somber, self-conscious weirdo who keeps staring at you in the mirror.)